First serious snowfall of the season

Yesterday, we had our first serious snowstorm of the season. I can't say it's the first one for the year, because we get serious snowstorms from January until April sometimes. And this morning, it was 13 F driving into work. Brrrr!! Today, I'm very thankful for cars with heaters that work really, really well.

Wordless Wednesday

Lovely Utah spring

Is this what you picture when you think of spring?

Only if you live in Utah.

Wacky Utah Weather

January in Utah is always a bad weather bet. We usually get some really nasty inversion in the Salt Lake Valley, and up and down the Wasatch Front in general. It's really weird to think that Park City, which is up in the mountains, can be warmer than Salt Lake in the middle of the day, but it happens a lot in January.

The last week, we had some huge snow storms come through that took out the inversion -- for now. It will be back, most likely by this weekend. But for now, it's easy to breathe, and I can see all of the mountains on all four sides of the valley. It's a beautiful thing.

Now that it's warming up, it's fun and a little scary to watch the snow melt and fall off the roof. This is how the house looked this morning as I drove to work.

Some serious slippage going there. But look at how beautiful the sky was at 7:15 am. Makes me happy to be able to breathe.

And just because I'm feeling a bit nostalgic and wishing this is what our weather was like right now, here's a panoramic shot from our trip to California in October.

I miss the beach and the ocean. A lot.

Wordless Wednesday

(I didn't take this picture, but I wish I had)

So much for fall

This year, fall lasted a little longer than usual in Utah. Halloween was the warmest on record (70+ degrees), and the leaves were beautiful. Of course, that was because it was so dry this summer and the fire hazard has been off the charts. Well, apparently fall is now over for the Beehive State. Today we are experiencing our first "real" snow storm. I have friends in New Jersey who will probably look at these pictures and say "Really? You call THAT a snow storm? Really?" as they were just hit by a hurricane followed quickly by a true Nor'easter that makes a heavy snow storm in Utah look like mild spring sprinkling. Whatever. I'm here in Utah. I'm cold. And this is what I see outside my office.

I'm now officially missing my favorite season of the year.

Alpine City fire

It's been so dry in Utah this summer. There are fires all over the state. My uncle and aunt live in Alpine, Utah. Yesterday, they had a serious wildfire that breach the city limits. A couple of neighborhoods in their ward were evacuated. Piano Uncle and Happy Aunt were prepared to evacuate, if needed, but their street was spared. Here's picture from the Salt Lake Valley of the smoke coming from the canyons. The fire was across the mountains in Utah County.

Welcome, Spring!

Well, sort of. Okay, welcome, spring in Utah. I took this picture on my way into work this morning. Literally. This tree is just outside the front door of my office. (Yes, I know that the sun wasn't up when I took this picture. I'm not a fan of Day Light Savings.)

Snow is falling all around...

Snow is falling all around

On the rooftops

On the ground.

Snow is falling on my nose,

On my head and hands and toes.

Okay, so you can't really tell by the picture, but it was snowing when I took it.

Looks like we're in for another typical Utah fall. Two weeks of lovely weather followed by six months of snow. *sigh*

Signs of fall

Everybody sing:

The weather, she's a-changing. She's a-changing today!!!

Okay, that's not really a song. I just made that up. But it's true. The weather has finally turned. After a long, long winter (ski resorts open until July? was that really necessary?), the world's wettest summer, and a hot, hot September, autumn has made it's way to Utah. YAY!

This is my favorite time of year. Between September and the first week of January, I get to experience many of my favorites:

• Favorite weather (I'm done with snow by about January 3)
• Favorite foliage colors
• Favorite foods available (can you say Farmer's Markets with fresh veggies and a whole slue of fruit varieties? and eating stuff that you've grown yourself? what's better than that?)
• Favorite holidays (yes, these include Labor Day, Columbus Day, and Veteran's Day)
• Favorite music (I know I'm weird, but I could listen to most Christmas music all year, not all Christmas music, just most of it)
• Favorite husband's birthday

See what I mean? It's just a good time to be on the earth. I even liked starting school when I was a kid. Yes, yes, I am that weird. I miss college. Some day, I'm going back for my Master's; it will happen. I've seen it.

Mr. Perfect and I are not that much into decorations when it comes to holidays, except Christmas, but a festive wreath on the door is a nice touch.

I know it doesn't show up so well against the color of the door, but you can believe me when I say that it's really nice and fall-ish.

It was well past time to replace the Welcome mat at the front door. (Shopko has them on sale right now for 1/2 off.)

 

And I know that everyone is on pins and needles waiting to hear how the unexpected pumpkin patch turned out.

Wait for it...


Wait for it...

Ta da!

Including two HUGE ones, perfectly shaped.

We leave them in the garage so the neighborhood kids will not be tempted into the sin of smashing them in the street. Can't you just see these all decked out for Halloween? Then the smashing can begin.

Thank you, Heavenly Father! You have given us a beautiful place to live.

I have discovered

I find clouds fascinating. I wish that I could take pictures of them and have them come out the way I see them. Is that me or the camera technology? Maybe I just have a strange skew on things that doesn't translate to film (or digital images).

Oh well. I still love clouds.

Rain, Rain, go away!

Okay, I know that late July and early August are monsoon season in Utah, but enough already! We're supposed to be living in a DESERT!

At least it's been really good for the garden. The pumpkin vines will soon be taking over the world, so you'd better watch out!

The first adventure of Percy and Harry

I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but my mother's father leased some land from the National Forest in the 1950s and built a cabin on it. It's in the Soapstone Recreational area, about 14 miles up the Mirror Lake Highway from Kamas, Utah.

Over the years, it has changed a bit. People have come and gone as part owners. Interior walls have come down. The stairway to the upper bedrooms moved completely. Electricity was added. And the bathroom has become a real bathroom.

Mr. Perfect loved the idea of a family cabin, just maybe not one quite so rustic as this one. The first time we took Beatles Lover and Game Boy, I think they were really scared of the place. They've only stayed overnight once (okay, it was for two nights, but still...).


For Christmas, Mr. Perfect gave me a beautiful pair of snowshoes. I love my snowshoes. They are a thing of beauty, and I plan on using them for many, many years.

So, on Tuesday, we packed up Dexter the Xter with the snowshoes, Mr. Perfect's cross-country skies, plenty of water and lunch, and headed up to Kamas. The weather reports said there was a 20% chance of snow in the afternoon, but Wednesday there was a 100% chance of snow.

The weather more than cooperated. It was beautiful the entire time we were there. The snow gates start at the Soapstone turn off, and the road down past the Provo River bridge was groomed. Past the groomed stuff, we followed snowmobile tracks on the road up to the gate and to the first fork after the gate. From there, we were cutting new trails.

The snow was about 3 feet deep, and the snowshoes handled it all perfectly. I mostly followed Mr. Perfect as he cut the trail ahead of me. It took us about 1-1/2 hours to get up to the cabin from the highway. It's a good thing we both love to walk and use the elliptical, treadmill, and stair climber on a semi-regular basis, otherwise we wouldn't have made it past the gate.

Once up, we built a nice fire. It took about an hour for the three feet in front of the fireplace to warm up enough for us to remove our coats. We ate our lunch, drank some water, and played plenty of Angry Birds. (Psychotically addictive game on Mr. Perfect's Droid X phone.)

After a couple of hours of rest and heat, Mr. Perfect headed up for some more skiing opportunities, and Most Happy Girl headed down towards the gate. I actually made it all the way back to the highway and sat waiting on the Provo River bridge for about five minutes before Mr. Perfect came into sight. Good thing there were no bears or crazy hunters in the area.

By now, you're probably asking yourselves "Who are Percy and Harry?" Good question. Another thing we did for Christmas was have a contest to find travel mascots similar to the Travelocity garden gnome. Well, ours are Percival the Penguin and Harold the Hound. They're small, cuddly, and fit perfectly into a fanny pack.

They made the trip with valiant courage, never wavering when asked to step into the deep snow and pose for a picture. What troopers.

So, here are some pictures from our first adventure with Percy and Harry.

Psycho Wunderhund and the snow

Here's a picture of Psycho Wunderhund's dog run with all of the mud and snow. Poor thing. Glad it's not me back there. He will be getting a Dogloo for Christmas, if we can determine he's past the puppy stage of chewing everything in sight.

The sun'll come out tomorrow...maybe

It's has snowed. A serious, major snowstorm. 10-12 inches of the fluffy white stuff, only it wasn't so fluffy. It was wet and heavy. Not the normal Utah power. But the first major snow of the year is rarely the beautiful stuff that truly is the great snow on Earth.

Sunday morning we awoke to it everywhere. Mr. Perfect shoveled Dexter out so we could go to church. He also helped Sweet Neighbor Lady with her driveway. After church, it was apparent that it wouldn't be sticking around too long (another quality of the first major storm of the year), but we just heard that there should be more coming. Yeah, us. There is a major blizzard warning from North Dakota through Colorado and on into California. Yes, we are in that path. Hunkering down should be an Olympic sport.

Mr. Perfect put up the first round of Christmas lights the night before, when it was just cold and very windy. He's such a trooper.

 Okay, so that is the pile after shoveling the driveway, but it's still a significant amount.

I just love this picture, that's why it's here.

So, what's the best thing to do when trying to stay warm and out of the messy, messy white stuff? Enjoy a pot of elk stew.

Winter in July...and not in the good way

Okay, so my cube at work is FREEZING! Mr. Perfect laughs at me most mornings when he sees me putting on a sweater before I head out the door for work. Yes, I know it's July 6. Yes, I know it's supposed to be somewhere around 90 today. Yes, I'm still wearing this sweater to work.

He's actually very good about my lack of body heat. It works well for us, because his body temperature is high, so at night cuddling works great for us because I cool him off and he heats me up. (Stop right now, that wasn't what I meant...although that's true, too.)

Freaky Utah weather

The weather here in Utah has been pretty bizarre this spring. Although I'm not entirely sure you could call what we just went through spring. Sure, we passed through the months of March, April, and May, but I doubt that May saw more than a handful of days over 65 degrees. We're more used to having two weeks of spring in late March/early April, and Zing! right on into summer.

What this all means is that our garden is growing at a very slow pace. We've planted sugar peas, carrots, beans, squash (no, not zucchini), cucumbers, and tomatoes. Everything is finally starting to show up through the dirt, except the cucumbers, which I have to admit we did not plant good and comely spot of the vineyard (hmmm....sounds like a Book of Mormon reference, doesn't it?). I'm most excited about the beans.

One perk from the freaky weather is that last night, Mr. Perfect and I were driving home from a family party in Lehi and the lightning storm was really cool. On the downside (aside from the slowness of the veggie growth) will be the gas bill, because it just kind of sucks to have to have the heater in the house still running in MAY!

Random weather at home and away

Beatles Lover and Most Happy Girl had a wonderful time visiting with friends in the great state of Michigan last week. Even though it rained almost every day, it never lasted long, and we were able to enjoy time at the beach and trips to South Bend and South Haven.

Pictures to follow. (I know I've said that before, but this time I'm serious!!!)